Site Navigation

Site Mobile Navigation

China Has Used Prison Labor in Africa

This is a digitized version of an article from The Times’s print archive, before the start of online publication in 1996.
To preserve these articles as they originally appeared, The Times does not alter, edit or update them.

Occasionally the digitization process introduces transcription errors or other problems.
Please send reports of such problems to archive_feedback@nytimes.com.

May 11, 1991, Page 001022 The New York Times Archives

To the Editor:

China's exploitation of prison labor to make low-cost products for export to the United States and other countries, as discussed by Orville Schell (Op-Ed, April 27), is only part of the story. The Chinese not only export goods made by prison labor, but they export prison workers too.

While living in West Africa a few years ago, I learned of the case of a Chinese construction company building a road in Benin using prison labor. Seventy percent to 75 percent of the construction workers were known to be prisoners. They were laboring on the Dassa-Parakou road in central Benin under a broiling sun and exposed to malaria and other tropical diseases. The company was the Jiangsu Construction Company, which also built a sports stadium in Cotonou, Benin's capital, and won a $3.5 million contract to build a hospital and mosque in Porto Novo. The company was able to underbid all its competitors by a wide margin because its labor costs were so cheap.

Each year, thousands of Chinese laborers are sent to Africa and other third-world countries to build roads and work on construction projects. Governments should insure that prison labor is specifically banned before they sign any contracts with Chinese companies. Exploitation of prison labor is an abuse of human rights and of commercial practice.

It certainly has long been known that China has a gulag in which, it is estimated, hundreds of thousands, even millions, toil. The horror of this, however, has not really registered internationally. Until such time as China brings its human rights and trade practices into line with elementary norms of international conduct, it does not deserve most favored nation treatment or any other indulgence from the United States Government. ROBERTA COHEN Washington, April 29, 1991 The writer, a trustees of the International League for Human Rights, was Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights in the Carter Administration.

A version of this letter appears in print on May 11, 1991, on Page 1001022 of the National edition with the headline: China Has Used Prison Labor in Africa. Today's Paper|Subscribe